As Media Studies 25/08/09

As a class we analysed the music magazine front cover of ‘Hip Hop Connection’ on the interactive board, discussing the conventions of a music magazine and how these attract and entice the readers. The key features we studied included; lighting, graphics, colour and font used, and the target audience. The ‘Hip Hop Connection’ magazine front cover used a big-bold red Sun Serif font as the mast-head; this was spanning the entire width of the page. The big-bold red font makes it stand out amongst the other music magazines on the shelf. It is also made the magazine recognisable and different from other music magazines (because no mast-head of a music magazine should have the same font). Overall the main colours used were red, black, and yellow. On an everyday basis these colours are seen as unisex colours but in analysing a music magazine we saw that these colours coincide with the conventions of a music magazine aimed at men (seeing as the majority of music magazine readers are men). The use of colour and the main cover image (which included a group of male artists and DJ’s from different races and cultures) also suggested that the target audience was men but also men from a wide range of cultures and races. One thing that I particularly found interesting to learn was that the main cover image was edited on Photoshop, what I mean is that the picture was put together on Photoshop. Because you see a mutual connection (through music) in the group of men you would assume that the picture was taken as a group photo, however this was single photos of each artist/DJ that they edited and put together on a street background using Photoshop. (The street background acts almost as a convention of/ connotes the “Urban”/ UK Hip Hop genre).
After this we were set in groups and was handed out a sheet consisting of the cover terminology, such as;
· Masthead - title of magazine
· Strap line – ‘sub-heading’
· Main Cover Line - insights/clips of inside articles. Also known as ‘sell lines’
· Mode of Address – question marks, exclamation marks, use of second person pronoun etc
· Main Cover Image – main image on page
· Graphic – often used to highlight a special offer
· Banner – a strap across top or bottom of page.
With this in mind and our knowledge from analysing ‘Hip Hop Connection’ in our groups we then had to analyse music magazine covers. These consisted of Q, MOJO, NME (New Music Express) and Rock Sound. My group analysed ‘Q’. Once again the mast-head and overall colour scheme was red, black and white; suggesting the target audience to be men. The mast-head was justified to the right in bold red so that the first letters can be read if the magazine is overlapped on a shelf. The main cover image had a sepia effect of a head to shoulder shot of a man looking in the distance; this created a sense of mystery. As with the mast-head the price was also in red, the highlighting of the price indicates that the price is a really good deal and purchasing this magazine is a secured bargain. The strap line “Britain’s Biggest Music Magazine” shows that this is a very popular, well anticipated magazine. The strap line persuades you to buy the magazine because they want you to see what all the ‘hype’ is about and join this greatness.